


Ryan Dalias Is Allowed to Feel Things

by Riley_Sivertsen



Series: in space no one can hear you deny your feelings [1]
Category: EOS 10 (Podcast)
Genre: Angst, Denial of Feelings, Eventual Happy Ending, Feelings Realization, Fluff and Angst, Grief/Mourning, Love Confessions, M/M, No Beta, This Does Not End Happily, but i had to write it, but there will be a follow-up eventually so, ryan dalias deserves a hug, seriously no beta and it shows
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-09-23
Updated: 2020-09-23
Packaged: 2021-03-07 17:28:15
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,846
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26611435
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Riley_Sivertsen/pseuds/Riley_Sivertsen
Summary: Ryan has a lot of feelings, ok? And he has a lot of fear around having feelings. So actually opening up about them is hard, ok? But sometimes even scary and difficult things are worth it. Sometimes someone is worth all of it.
Relationships: Akmazian/Ryan Dalias
Series: in space no one can hear you deny your feelings [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1935898
Comments: 10
Kudos: 24





	Ryan Dalias Is Allowed to Feel Things

**Author's Note:**

> In case this is hard to keep track of, here is a list of the various episodes where scenes in this fic takes place:  
> \- 201 Trial of Akmazian  
> \- 202 Last Offices  
> \- 207 I've Got a Feeling  
> \- 210 And Beyond  
> (random sceens between these two episodes)  
> \- 302 Death Becomes Them ll  
> \- 308 The Event

_Ryan sat on his bed, knees drawn protectively to his chest and his arms wrapped around them, as if by physically protecting his heart, it was any less vulnerable. He knew it was meaningless, but it made him feel a bit more in control. He’d spent so long preparing for this conversation, and now that it was here, he felt so exposed._

_The only reason he didn’t back out was because he wanted the person sitting across the room from him to see. He did. He’d spent long enough cowering and denying his feelings. The man with the long hair and scarred face patiently leaning against Ryan’s desk, looking at him like he was the only source of light in the whole universe – he deserved Ryan’s courage. He deserved the truth._

_Ryan took a deep breath, and tried to figure out where to start._

_“You know, I don’t…really let myself believe in things? Take things on faith alone. I can’t afford to. I need to know; believing isn’t an option. Faith comes in limited supply and I ran out years before I set foot on Eos 10. So, in the beginning, it didn’t matter if there where moments where I wanted to believe you were innocent; I_ had _to doubt you. I know I came across convincingly but there were times I had to force myself to keep believing you were guilty. So when you finally managed to show me actual evidence of your innocence, I was so relieved. Terrified, but relieved.”_

*

They were travelling back from the Adrarian Sector, where everything Ryan knew and relied on had been turned on its head thanks to the existence of a planet that wasn’t meant to be there anymore.

Ryan’s mind was reeling. Someone in the Alliance had faked the destruction of an entire society that didn’t exist on a planet that _wasn’t_ destroyed. That in itself was knowledge with some massive consequences, and yet it wasn’t the foremost thing Ryan was losing his mind over.

_I don’t even_ like _you._

He had shouted those words just a few hours ago. Shouted them because Akmazian had preformed a freaking puppet show for him and it was the dumbest, cutest thing Ryan had ever seen and he had _wanted_ to believe so badly but he couldn’t, couldn’t risk that he was wrong and being played. It had been easy to shout those words at Akmazian, because over the past fifteen years, Ryan’s body had become familiar with the feeling of wanting something he couldn’t have. And he didn’t think he could have this…

But now.

Now he had seen the very planet Akmazian was accused of destroying and everything was shifting. Now he had tangible evidence of Akmazian’s innocence, and he could feel how much of a lie those words he’d said before really were.

_I don’t even like you._

Ryan would have laughed if he wasn’t so terrified of what might come next. Because now that he knew, he couldn’t keep telling himself that lie, could he? And when he couldn’t tell himself that lie, everything he’d been pushing to the back of his mind suddenly seemed very difficult to ignore.

It wasn’t so bad until Jane left the two of them alone for a while and Ryan glanced at Akmazian in the pilot seat, and found him already looking back. He seemed like he was trying so hard not to sound afraid when he asked…

“Do you believe me?”

“Yes,” Ryan said, without a second thought or hesitation.

The relief, the _joy_ on Akmazian’s face, in his wide open eyes and easy-going grin; how could Ryan _not_ kiss him when he looked like that? He might as well decide to stop his blood from flowing.

They met in the middle of their respective seats, mouths clashing together like awkward school children, but it only took a second for their lips to adjust, for them to fit together the way they were supposed to, tasting each other for the first time and urging mouths open to taste even more.

Ryan thought this must be the single brightest moment of his life.

And then they heard Jane come back up the stairs and automatically broke apart, and before they could process anything or exchange any words at all, Jane was there and they were being hailed for approach, and then… And then…

Then they were on Eos 10 and the Alliance was waiting for them. Ryan was taken into custody without any fuss, but Akmazian was clamped in handcuffs and escorted away roughly by angry security guards, and he didn’t even fight them.

All he did was look back at Ryan with a smile like it had all been worth it for that one moment on the bridge of the Silent Storm.

That’s when Ryan got terrified again.

*

_“Do you remember when we spoke at my father’s wake?” Ryan asked. “You wondered if you could ask me something. I think you saw it in my eyes right then that I wasn’t ready to have that conversation, about what our kiss meant and what came next. And because you’re a more understanding person than I deserve, you changed your question halfway through and instead asked if I would be okay. Then you never mentioned it again. You let me take the lead, wait until I was ready… And because I’m a coward, it took me an embarrassingly long time.”_

_He pretended not to notice that Akmazian moved from his position at the desk to sit at the very edge of the bed, the expanse of the mattress the only distance left between them._

_“I am sorry that it took me this long,” Ryan added hoarsely._

*

Ryan wasn’t certain he ever would have reached a place where he could admit his feelings if he hadn’t met a certain Aldorian on the beaches of Galifray. Even after that life-changing meeting, though, Ryan hadn’t been able to own up to it the moment he returned to Eos 10.

When Dr. Urvidian made a joke about Ryan spending time with a man on vacation, Ryan instantly got defensive. He knew Urvidian meant nothing by it, but when everything was still so fresh, it still felt like the universe trying to force him into coming out and he had to deny it like he always did.

He had admitted his feelings to himself – he couldn’t deny them anymore if he tried – but that wasn’t the same thing as saying it out loud and actually going after what he wanted. The idea of that still scared him.

But he did manage one, small step forward. It felt safer, somehow, to tell the Interface when they asked. Yes, he was vague, but it still felt nice to say the words out loud to someone who was in his day-to-day life.

_I have feelings for someone._

It wasn’t much, but it was his, and it felt good.

*

_“It took me such a long time,” Ryan said, feeling embarrassed. “I can cut people open; I can survive Jane and Levi’s shenanigans and shoot Dr. Urvidian to make a flu vaccine and battle murderous plants, but the idea of admitting my feelings for you, everything laid bare, that was the line I was too afraid to cross.” He chuckled shyly. “You’re more frightening than anything I’ve ever faced before, do you know that?”_

*

Ryan was being pathetic, and he knew it. He was better than this! He’d survived a shattered spine and fifteen years of recovery from addiction; Ryan could handle marching up to a tall, rugged space pirate with a flattering trench coat and long braided hair that looked _really_ good and tell the man how he felt.

Except apparently he couldn’t.

In his defence, sometimes the chickening out wasn’t his fault! There were circumstances. Disruptive, distracting circumstances that Ryan could in no way be held accountable for. The very existence of Levi and Jane in his life made that pretty much inevitable.

And yeah, okay, sometimes there was no one and nothing to blame but Ryan himself. He could admit that; he wasn’t ashamed of his natural instinct to flee from any genuine emotional expression.

Okay, he was a _little_ ashamed of it.

Then, after the incident with the Orchid, Ryan’s fear changed to being afraid _of_ Akmazian to being worried sick _for_ Akmazian.

The man wasn’t in his cargo bay the first few times Ryan went to look for him after the Orchid, and Ryan started to panic. When he returned to check for the third time and found Akmazian grumbling as he fiddled with something on the wall, Ryan didn’t even have time to question himself before he engulfed Akmazian in a relieved hug. The other man hesitated for a moment before returning the embrace.

“What, were you worried about me?” he asked teasingly. “The saucier got us a bit lost on our way tryin’ to help you.”

“Of course he did.” Ryan wasn’t remotely surprised. “I hope you didn’t kill him; there’s a line.” He released his hold on Akmazian and tried not to get distracted by how much he hated stepping away – he was sick and tired of running and he needed to spit the words out now before he could change his mind again.

“Would you mind coming to my quarters in a bit? If you can get there safely,” Ryan asked. “There are a lot of things we need to talk about, and I don’t really want to do it in a cargo bay.”

Akmazian looked confused for a moment, before a tiny spark of hope flickered across his eyes. Hope that made Ryan a little less afraid. “Now?” he asked carefully.

“I think we’ve waited enough, don’t you?”

*

_“You have no idea how much nervous pacing I did while waiting for you to get here. Morpheus got so scared of my feet that he’s still hiding on top of the bookshelf. But…you showed up, and here I am, baring my soul like a teenager in a diary and I guess the point of all this is just to tell you that…our kiss on the Silent Storm meant something to me, and…and I’m through pretending I don’t have feelings for you._ Because I do _.”_

*

“I, uh…guess that’s it?” Ryan finished sheepishly. He wasn’t usually one to feel shy, but this was a new situation. When he glanced up at Akmazian, he worried what he would see, but all he found were eyes nearly as black as space itself, looking back at him with a twinkle of fond amusement.

“Now, was that so hard?” he asked with his ridiculous drawl. There was laughter in his eyes but a vulnerability to his voice that betrayed how effected he was by Ryan’s speech.

“Maybe not,” Ryan whispered, daring to raise his head fully. He’d been hiding long enough. “Come here?”

Akmazian smiled brighter than any star in the galaxy. He crossed the last few centimetres between them until his face hovered close enough that Ryan’s could feel his breath on his skin.

“What do you want, Dr. Dalias?” Akmazian whispered.

Ryan allowed himself to stare where he’d previously forced himself to look away. He drank in every detail of Akmazian’s face, every faint scar, the smooth surfaces between them, the rings beneath his eyes that marked the permanent exhaustion from so long on the run.

Gods, he was beautiful. And Ryan was allowed to admit it.

“I want _you_ ,” Ryan said, announcing each syllable like it was an oath, and he thought maybe it was the truest thing he’d ever said.

Then Akmazian was kissing him, chapped lips melting against Ryan’s with the desperate hunger of someone who had been kept waiting for far too long, and nothing else mattered. They leaned into each other’s touch. Sometime they would finish this very important conversation, but right now, all there was were lips, and hands, and skin, and an overwhelming feeling of rightness.

*

“What are you staring at?” Ak asked with faux indignity.

“You, and ssshh,” Ryan shushed. “I’m counting your scars.”

“That does _not_ sound like a fun pastime.”

Ryan traced his fingertips over a particularly long and jagged scar on Akmazian’s abdomen, faded pink still standing out against the brown skin. “I’m not doing it for _fun_ ,” he insisted.

“Why, then?” Ak cocked his head like a curious puppy, and Ryan smothered the urge to laugh and kiss him – he was _busy_!

“Two reasons,” Ryan said matter-of-factly. “First, as a test of my medical knowledge. I’m seeing if I can guess the cause of them all.”

“I always knew you were a nerd,” Akmazian muttered.

“Hush, you,” Ryan chastised, the effect only slightly negated by the soft kiss he pressed just above Ak’s navel.

“What’s the second reason?” Ak asked, amused.

Ryan felt himself blush and let some of his hair fall in front of his face. It was unusually efficient – he hadn’t gotten around to cutting it in a while and his hair was longer than it had ever been.

“I want to know every detail of your body,” he said before pressing another kiss to Ak’s chest. A rough, broad hand came to rest on his cheek, turning him until he was looking up at Akmazian’s whirlpool-deep eyes.

“You don’t have to hide when you say stuff like that, Ryan,” Ak said sweetly. “I always knew you were a hopeless romantic underneath all that denial.”

Ryan couldn’t help his stupid grin and had to scoot up a bit so he could press a kiss to Akmazian’s lips. Strong arms wrapped around him and pulled until Ryan’s body was fully on top of Ak’s, every surface of their skin touching as their kiss deepened from something soft to something passionate that left Ryan panting when they finally came up for air.

“I am _not_ a hopeless romantic,” Ryan insisted when he found his voice again. “You’re just impossible not to…”

Ryan trailed off, that familiar fear making a renewed appearance in his stomach, but Ak’s eyes were warm and understanding and looked at him with an awe he didn’t deserve.

“Yeah?” he asked, almost shyly.

“Yeah,” Ryan whispered. It was the most he could say without ancient fears stopping him, but it was enough.

Akmazian kissed him again, and again, and again, and it was everything.

*

“Would you be _quiet_?” Ryan tried to control his breathing so he wouldn’t lose it in a fit of giggles. “There’s no point going through all the trouble of sneaking you in here if you’re just gonna summon security with your howling.”

“Excuse you,” Ak said. “If you didn’t look so damn good in those little swim shorts and got all pink when I complimented you, I wouldn’t _have_ to howl. Now get in the damn pool so I can enjoy the show?”

Ryan rolled his eyes, unsure if it was visible with the houselights off and just the underwater lighting filtering up through the water. He liked the pool better like this, after closing, but it was definitely an improvement with the current company.

“The _show_ ,” Ryan muttered as he climbed up on the plinth. “Some of us take our exercise very seriously, you know.”

“Oh, I know.” Akmazian grinned from where he sat with his feet in the water on the sideline. He looked much too smug right now.

Ryan gave him a wink before he dived into the pool with perfect form. If he was going to be ogled by a handsome space pirate, he might as well make it worth both of their time.

*

From where they dozed on Ryan’s bed, tightly wrapped in each other’s arms, it felt like the whole station was silent. Nothing seemed to exist outside of Ryan’s head on Ak’s chest, listening to the steady beat of his heart. Ak’s breath tickling Ryan’s ear and his fingers combing through Ryan’s hair with a delicate reverence that you wouldn’t know the calloused hand was capable of.

_Perfect_ , Ryan thought.

This was a perfect moment.

Ryan laced his hand together with the one Akmazian rested on his stomach. Their fingers slit together without effort, and Ak started humming a soft melody that Ryan could feel through his chest. The vibrations tickled his ear, and he smiled and leaned into it, because he loved everything about this moment and didn’t want to miss a single thing. When Akmazian’s humming turned to singing, Ryan thought he might melt with joy, it was such a lovely sound.

“I’m really happy,” he whispered into Ak’s chest, not even sure if he’d been heard until the hand in his hair slipped around and tilted Ryan’s chin to look at the beautiful man underneath him.

“You make me happy, too,” Ak said with the most genuine smile that outshone every sun in the galaxy. They looked at each other for a long moment, needing no further words, and then Ak started singing again and their perfect moment got to last just a little bit longer.

*

Ryan stared down at his empty bed.

The same bed where he and Akmazian had made love; where they curled up together to sleep in the safety of each other’s arms; where they enjoyed stolen long mornings on the days Ryan hadn’t had to rush to the med bay.

It was the same bed, but no one except Ryan knew that anyone named Akmazian had ever been anywhere near it. They didn’t know Akmazian had ever been _anywhere_. Ryan felt numb as he stared down at the firm mattress and the pillow that couldn’t hold a candle to the broad softness of Ak’s chest.

He couldn’t feel a thing.

No, that wasn’t true. He felt…a lot of things.

They were right there, within reach, but it was all just so impossible that he couldn’t quite pull them to the surface.

It was impossible, because Akmazian was larger than life; loud and full of energy and passion that the galaxy hadn’t been able to beat out of him no matter how hard it tried. It just didn’t make any sense that Akmazian the Destroyer of Stars could ever be forgotten by anyone, not when he had been so infamous, not when they had worked so hard to try to clear his name.

Akmazian wasn’t _forgettable._

He couldn’t just be _thrown away_ and _erased_.

It just wasn’t possible.

Which was why Ryan couldn’t bring himself to process it. This world, this place, whatever it was, it had people alive who should be dead, it had people healthy and functioning who had been addicts, it had…It had…

It had nothing, without Akmazian.

But that’s not what Ak would have to say about it.

Ryan knew that; knew that whatever happened here wasn’t something he could reverse just like that. For now, he couldn’t go and try to mess with whatever had already gotten messed up. He had to leave things as they were. And that knowledge would kill him if he let himself feel all the things that lurked beneath the surface.

So he turned his back to the bed, shoved those thoughts further down, and started packing for a family trip with his parents.

*

After talking to Ben on Adrarian Prime, after having to admit out loud to Dr. Urvidian that Akmazian would never in a million light-years want to live at the expense of an entire civilization, Ryan didn’t have the power to bury his feelings any longer. 

He had lost Akmazian, and he was never getting him back. 

Ryan sat curled up on the floor of his chambers and let himself cry.

He allowed the violent sobs of pain and grief rock his body and scratch his throat and he didn’t care who heard him. He didn’t care about anything at all except the gaping, excruciating hole in his heart where Akmazian was supposed to be.

Ryan never even told Ak he loved him, he realized, and his sobs grew louder. He’d tried to say it with every look, with every touch and kiss and moment they shared together, but he’d never actually spoken the words out loud.

All of Ryan's memories of past physical and emotional pain seemed to pale now, becoming shadows in the face of this new reality. The reality where Ryan would never wake up to hear Ak’s heartbeat, or feel his rough hands move gently through his hair or see that mischievous smile fade into something soft and sweet that was only ever for Ryan.

Ryan barely noticed when the door to his room opened. He didn’t question it when Maddox sat down next to him on the floor, though later he would explain that he heard the sobs and used his security clearance to get in.

Maddox didn’t say anything for a while, just sat there and listened to Ryan breaking.

“You’re not getting your missing family member back, are you?” he eventually asked. “I’m so sorry.”

Ryan nearly broke all over again at the sincerity in Maddox’s voice, and he didn’t resist when a strong arm wrapped around his shoulders. He leaned into the security chief and allowed himself to be held while he sobbed into this person he hardly knew.

Part of him wanted to scream at Maddox to go away, to not intrude on his grief, because he didn’t want or deserve to be comforted when he’d failed the man he loved.

Except, a quiet voice in his head reminded him, Akmazian wouldn’t want Ryan to be dying alone in his room, drowning in his own tears.

He wouldn’t want Ryan to punish himself for making the right decision; he would probably chew him out for it.

It was only when Ryan realized how grateful Akmazian would be that there was someone here to offer him comfort, that Ryan started getting his breathing under control. Eventually the sobs grew less violent, and then they stopped completely.

All that was left were silent tears spilling down his face and staining Maddox’s shirt.

The pain didn’t go anywhere; the grief, the loss, the aching hole in his heart didn’t feel any less like it should kill him. But he couldn’t justify wallowing when he knew exactly what Akmazian would say.

And he _did_ know.

Even if they’d had too little time together, what they had was something real. They knew each other better than anyone. Ryan could almost hear the words Ak would have said to ensure Ryan moved on with his life and didn’t lose everything else just because he lost _him_.

That was why Ryan allowed Maddox to keep his arms around him until Ryan didn’t have any tears left in his body.

That was probably why, several days later, when Maddox shyly asked Ryan out with the promise of not rushing anything or forcing him to move on too quickly, Ryan said yes.

He would never stop loving Akmazian. But he could never stop living a life Akmazian would approve of, either.

Out of everything Akmazian deserved, living was the least Ryan could do.

**Author's Note:**

> Comments joy to my heart and do wonders for my mental wellbeing, if you want to leave them ♥️
> 
> You can come shriek at me about multiple fandoms on tumblr @mx-riley and I hope you're being kind and taking care of yourself in these hard times. Did you take your meds today? 😘


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